Wednesday, May 28, 2008

I am currently sitting on the bus, riding home from work. I am riding a fast bus. The fast buses are the same type of buses that are used for tour buses. They have a lot of Cargo space under the seats, and they have used that space to install networking equipment. I must say, it works rather well.

Sunday, May 25, 2008

Stardate - years ago when we were first married. We were living in a basement apartment, and it was time to go to church. We got ready and headed out the door. When we arrived at the car we discovered that neither one of us had the keys. Not only were we locked out of the car, but the house as well. We could not get let in by the owners, as they were at church. So I started checking if we had left any windows open. We did not.

So there we were stuck. We were attending a Student Ward and the church was much too far to walk. The Owner would not be home for several hours. I came walking back to the front yard after checking the windows in the back yard (Again), and what did I find in my pocket? The Missing keys.

No, they were not there before. When something is missing, I check where it is supposed to be every two seconds, because there is no possible way that I left it elsewhere. They simply weren't there before. Now they were, 20 minutes later.

What brought this to mind was the fact that Yesterday, my wife was holding an open house for a client of hers (she's a Realtor) and I decided it was time to delve into the Flopside Pit of 100 trials, and get it over with. I powered up the Wii, but a friend of ours had been over and he had been playing Metroid. In fact, I recalled seeing him pop Super Paper Mario out of the Wii and place it gently on the entertainment system while he put Metroid in, however I did not see what he did with the disc after that because I walked out of the room.

I checked the Obvious place first, the case for Super Paper Mario. Empty.
I checked the Zipper Case in which I keep Wii and Playstation 2 games. It was not there.
Then I checked the Entertainment system where I had seen him lay the disc. Nope, not there either.
Then I checked ALL the Wii cases on the shelf. It was not in any of them.
Then I checked ALL the slots in the Zipper Case. No. . . not there.
Then I checked the extra, empty DVD case that sits on the shelf for lending DVD's to people. Still empty.
Then I checked all those places again. . . . . and again . . . . . and again.
Then I called my friend's brother, because my friend was at work. He checked the Wii game cases at his house. Nothing of mine was found in their cases.
I checked All the DVD players because we had had a Babysitter over the previous evening, and you never know what kind of Hijinks are going on when that's the case. Nothing out of the ordinary.
Then I checked All the Wii cases on our shelf and the Zipper Case AGAIN.
It was nowhere to be found, and I gave up looking.

This morning I was sitting here and I was mulling over where in the world the game disc could be.
I walked over to the shelf and checked the Super Paper Mario case again.
The first place I looked. (And the Fourth, and the Eighth, and the Twelfth, etc.)
I'm standing there feeling rather . . . odd. Kind of like that cool floaty feeling I get when I'm really zoned into an art project I'm working on, except twisted and weird. I don't really know how to explain.
Confused times several.
There it was, right in front of me, acting like it had been there the whole time.

Thursday, May 22, 2008

I've been meaning to mention this for about a week now. A friend of ours that works someplace that sells electronics obtained an early copy of Wii Fit. (This would have been a much cooler post if I had actually posted before Wii Fit was released.)So, early impressions. The Yoga and Strength Exercises are more workout than I thought they would be.For an Obese fellow I have excellent balance. The Balance and Aerobic Sections are just plain Fun; and I can see actually burning some fat playing. Mostly because I read this. I played for about 45 minutes and didn't feel like I had really exerted myself that much. I have a C-note from Christmas that has been patiently waiting for Wii Fit to arrive. But I think I may have been a little too complacent about the whole pre-order thing. I went to purchase it Wednesday and it was sold out at the 3 different locations I tried. I'm having my friend check if he can pick one up for me. I think why I delayed writing about this was that I wanted to have my own copy first, so I could play it a few days consistently before I made any judgement. Since my obtaining of the device has been delayed, and I have been prodded by more than one person that I need to make a new post, I have decided to comment regardless. As you can see however that has made my thoughts on the subject a little bit disjointed. One of the balance games is a Ski Jump, and another is a Slalom. Both very fun, if somewhat short, though I have not played long enough to unlock longer/advanced versions of all the games. One of my favorite arcade games of all time, was Alpine Racer. I dropped many a quarter into that machine. While it's not quite the same, it's similar enough to make me nostalgic, and now I really really want to Pick up We Ski.Also skate it has been announced for Wii, which will utilize the Balance Board. I will probably have more to say, but my thoughts are too disjointed to say more at this time.

Thursday, May 08, 2008

Yesterday the Zune software and Firmware were updated. And I must say. I'm loving it!!

Let me tell you how I got a Zune. At the beginning of this year I was working as a telephone technical support technician. The project to which I was assigned, was to support Microsoft Employees. This was a new project and they planned to have us train for one month starting December and start taking calls early January. Training only took 2 and a half weeks, and the phone system wasn't ready for prime time until Late February. That's a LOT of time sitting around doing nothing. Now, as an incentive they put our name in a pot each day we were there for training. Now the funny thing is that I only missed one day of training. The day they drew names out of the pot. That's how I knew that my chances for winning would go through the roof, it's always the guy not there that wins. Luckily this was just after the 2nd generation Zune was released. So I found myself the owner of an 80 Gig Zune.

I had never even considered getting a Zune. But now that I have it. I can honestly say that I like it lot more than the iPods with which I've played. If the Choice is between a classic iPod and a Zune, get the Zune. If the choice is between a Zune and an iPhone/iPod touch that question is harder. The iPhone/iPod touch is definitely the cooler gadget, but comparatively has a dinky hard drive.

Anyway, I loved just about everything about the Zune. There was a little learning curve as far as the synchronization (shortly after I filled up the Zune, I plugged it in and it promptly removed All the movies I had loaded). Once I learned how this worked, it was no longer a problem. It's the one thing that I did not find intuitive, well that and the way it sorts Albums is a little odd. Albums that have Multiple artists (mostly Soundtracks in my case) end up being broken up by artist so you can't just play the Whole Album without a play list. But a little research on my part discovered that it sorts by a metatag called Album Artist, so I just had to edit those tags.

This brings me to the first part of the update that I like. Previously, I pretty much ignored the Zune software and used it solely for syncing my Zune to the Computer. I could not edit the Metadata with the Zune software. I used iTunes for that. However this new iteration of Zune software allows for metadata editing.

The Second thing I noticed is that the Status bar at the bottom of the software that tells you how much space is used, has more divisions. Previously it told you how much space was used by music and how much was used by video. I've noticed that now it has a separate section for Podcasts, I don't know if it has a section for Images, I have so few on my Zune that if it did the bar would be far too small to see.

Speaking of Podcasts. It now will play podcasts like it does music. When one ends it immediately goes to the next in the series. I no longer have to tell it to start playing the next one, which was the only thing that I didn't like about the way it handled podcasts. It was a very very minor qualm, that none the less has been resolved.

One of my biggest annoyances with the Zune software, was the way it handled the Thumbnail image for Videos. It didn't cache them and had to regenerate them every time you scrolled up and down the list. That has been fixed and it speeds up dealing with Videos. Also the Metadata for Videos can be Edited as well, which is Awesome.

You can now create what iTunes called smartlists, dubbed Auto playlists. When the Zune Synchs, it now displays the percentage on the Zune screen as well, which is a nice touch, so you dont have to go back to the Device Status screen in the software to see how far along it is in the process.

They added some features to the "Social" section as well, but I'm not even part of the Demographic that those features are aimed toward, so I've never joined the "cult" I don't share what I listen to with the Internet. The Internet should not know. Stay away from me you lousy Internet! Get off the Lawn!! . . . Dang Kids.

Monday, May 05, 2008

I caught Iron Man this weekend. Unlike all the other super hero movies that have come out in recent years, Iron Man is a story with which I am not familiar. I loved every minute of this movie. I loved Robert Downey Jr's portrayal of Tony Stark. Comic Book movies that are done right, take the source material seriously. In fact they act as though the source material were classic literature. They make sure that all the classic Icons and trappings are in place, though the only one I was even remotely familiar with was S.H.I.E.L.D.. That is not to say that you cannot make fun of the source material. The scenes where Tony was testing the technology were hilarious, in fact, a lot of this movie was hilarious. But unlike some recent Marvel Comics Movies (Namely Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer, Spider-Man 3, Ghost Rider, X-Men: The Last Stand, Fantastic Four, & Hulk [i.e.nearly every Marvel Comics movie made since 2003])I was never pulled out of the moment because I lost my suspension of belief. This is one of the greatest super hero movies ever made, which surprised me. I was excited for all of the above listed movies and was let down in varying degrees by all of them, so much so that I didn't buy any of them. I will be buying Iron Man.

Thursday, May 01, 2008

The company I work for has a new building that they are moving people into. As part of IT I am helping set up phones. Usually when we head over to the other building my supervisor drives. Today he asked me to check out the car.

So we were driving and then I saw a cop behind me. So I pulled over. And he pulled behind me. My supervisor asked how fast I was going. I said 35 (which was the speed limit). I hadn't run a light. Needless to say, I was confused.

He asked me why I didn't yield to a pedestrian. I told him that I had not seen a pedestrian. When he went back to his Car. I asked my supervisor if he had seen a pedestrian. He said he saw a guy standing on the sidewalk.

Now I must point out the fact that the person behind me was pulled over by a Motorcycle Cop. OH! and the person behind her was pulled over by a Motorcycle Cop.

Yeah, how convenient that 3 people in a row didn't stop because a guy was standing on the sidewalk, and there happened to be 3 Cops watching.

Edit: I forgot to mention. The handwriting on the ticket is so horrible, I have NO idea of the amount of the fine. Frankly, I can't even tell if there is an amount listed. It hasn't been posted on the website yet either.